Self-Proclaimed Psychic Who Defrauded IRS Sees Prison In Her Future

If self-proclaimed psychic Sally Ann Johnson has made any predictions about her future, they have to include prison bars.

A federal judge sentenced Johnson, 41, also known as Angela Johnson, Angelia Johnson and Sally Reed, to 26 months in prison for defrauding the Internal Revenue Service when she hid $3,567,300 she received from an elderly Massachusetts woman, according to a news release from the U. S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts.

Also on tap for Johnson’s future are some debts that are not going to be easy to pay. In addition to the prison time, the judge ordered Johnson to repay the money she took from the woman, as well as $725,912 she owes to the IRS.

Court records detail a lonely woman who was faced with the twin problems of constipation and being surrounded by demons, with Johnson swooping in to offer a cure and then never leaving.

Johnson claimed to be helping the woman with exorcisms, psychic readings and spiritual cleansing and strengthening, using items such as crystals, stones, and meditation in a process that took seven years and showed no signs of ending.

Johnson hid the payments from the IRS through the use of multiple bank accounts, charged the victim’s credit card for numerous purchases and had the woman pay her bills.

During the seven years, Johnson never filed a tax return or repaid any of the money, according to court documents.

In an 80-page document accompanying a sentencing memorandum, an assistant U. S. Attorney reprinted e-mails the woman sent to Johnson. In some of those messages, the woman detailed all of the steps she was taking to keep sending money to Johnson.

She wrote of planning to sell her house to find a smaller, less expensive home and selling items she owned.

“I hope you will continue until I can get more money,” the woman wrote in one email and she used variations of that phrase in others. As she kept giving Johnson money, she accompanied the money with apologies for not being able to send her more and assured Johnson that her financial situation would get better.

Featured image credit: Tyler PerezShutterstock Images

In competing sentencing memorandums, the government and Johnson’s attorneys disagreed on the mental status of the victim, with the government claiming Johnson had entered into a fraudulent relationship with “an elderly woman of diminished capacity” and defense attorneys disputing that assessment.

The government asked the judge to sentence Johnson to a maximum of three years, while defense attorneys requested a minimum sentence.

The prison sentence will likely spell the end for Johnson’s psychic businesses, including Flatiron Psychic, Psychic Match, Inc., and Psychic Spiritual Salon.